In Amazing Things Are Happening Here , Jacob M. Appel's seventh collection of short stories, the shadows of ordinary lives hide unsettling truths: a judge recalls his teenage entanglement in a classmate's murder, a niece is drawn into her aunt's obsessive pursuit of a foliage painter, and siblings' lives unravel when a mercurial houseguest arrives on the Florida coast. With dark wit and piercing insight, Appel reveals how ordinary choices spiral into unforeseen consequences for both the guilty and the innocent.